Occupy LSX

I've been following the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations quite closely since they started and decided to take a trip down to London today in order to see how things were at Occupy London Stock Exchange.    Out of convenience the media are calling this movement 'anti-capatalist' and whilst there are some demonstrators who would certainly like to see an end to capitalism, I think it's a misleading to say that this is what the demonstration is about.

There are many factors at work here but I think bottom line is that some people are fed up with the unequal distribution of wealth, worldwide really.  That whenever there is a recession, it is always those at the bottom of the pile who end up paying dearly for it - through cut-backs which lead to job losses and a fall in the general standard of care all round.   At a time when the normal person in the street is forced to tighten their belt, the rich appear to be immune to the effects of recession.   This cannot be fair. We see that government officials have fingers in corporation pies, and conclude that they are just rubbing each other's backs while the general populace is left to go to hell in a handcart.

So you have those who are demonstrating for a fairer society.

We have students demonstrating who are facing an even deeper debt-laden future as university fees are poised to go up dramatically.  We see politicians becoming part of a coalition and doing dramatic u-turn's on their own party's policies (Lib-Dems were against increasing university fees).  These students are our future, and we want to weigh them down with impossible financial burdens before they are even in the workplace.  That isn't right.

We have a government wishing to make sweeping reforms in the NHS - we have whole departments in local hospitals reduced from 60 odd staff down to 6, and once again valuable nursing staff having the humility of having to apply for their own jobs.  If they don't get a place on their current level their options are to apply for lower banded jobs, or leave.   What sort of society have we built that we allow footballers, musicians and actors to reap huge financial rewards for the right to entertain us, whilst the essential roles of nurses, fire fighters, ambulance staff etc., are blatantly disregarded and amongst the first to suffer from our government's 'tightening of the belt' policy.

That isn't anti-capitalism -that's just plain unfair and it really is time something was done about it.

So because of these and other issues I found myself on a long bus journey to London this morning.  As the media are only reporting the controversial issues of the demonstration, all had been quiet for the past few days so I didn't know whether or not there were still any demonstrators there to go and register my support with, or whether they had all gone home.  I took the gamble knowing there is always plenty of things to do and see in our capital so it wouldn't be a wasted journey whatever the outcome.

It was a cracking day weather-wise as I walked along the embankment with the dome of St Paul's drawing me closer.   I was pleased to see around 200 tents erected outside the cathedral and a bit of a pow-wow was in full flow on the plaza at the bottom of the cathedral steps.  It was hard to tell how many of the folks gathered there were tourists, visitors or genuine demonstrators, but there was a healthy throng.

The camp itself was well organised with refuse and fire facilities and an info tent and working parties set up to deal with all aspects of the demonstration.   The site itself was a little cramped and it was difficult to take part in a discussion going on outside the Star.Books (a pun on the Starbucks shop which was in the background) tent without tripping over other tents and one of my impressions was that they really needed to either relocate to a bigger site, or set up camp at a second site if they wanted more people to join them.  Even just psychologically the lack of space outside St Paul's would put off more people being added to their number.  I have since read that they are to set up a second camp at Finsbury Square, which can accommodation up to 400 tents.

While it is more a forum for discussion about how to move things forward, than a series of demands, I did feel that they should be engaging passers by with either a hand out of their manifesto (which was displayed in various parts of the camp) or in conversation - a bit of a wasted opportunity, but maybe one that they can address in the coming days or weeks.

At the end of the day, real change will come when enough normal folks like you and me decide that it's about time we took a stand for what is right.

Here's a  few photos that I took from the camp - the rest are in my pix.ie account which you can find here